travelling post-office just as the train began to
move.

Old Tom Barnett had been in the Post-office
service in one capacity or other for nearly forty
years, during the whole of which time no word
of complaint had ever been uttered against him,
and, a strict disciplinarian himself, he naturally
felt that there must have been some dereliction
of duty on the part of his brother-guard of the
up-mail, of which the robbers had taken advantage.
Consequently, as the train flew through
the black darkness at forty-mile-an-hour speed,
Barnett, at five-minute intervals, lowered the
window of the travelling-office and peered out
in the direction of his "tender." He could not
distinguish much; all he could make out (and
this principally from the shadows thrown on the
embankments) was that the train was, as usual,
a short one: that immediately after the engine
came two second-class carriages, then the
travelling-office in which he was, then his tender,
then a first-class carriage, and then finally a
luggage-van. Nothing particular was to be seen,
nothing at all (save the invariable ramping, roaring,
and rattle) was to be heard; on they sped
through the darkness, and never stopped until
they came to Bridgewater, where old Barnett
descended, took his key from his pocket,
unlocked the tender, and—fell back, calling, at the
top of his voice, "Help!—thieves!—damme,
they've done me!" At his cry, two of the
trainguards came running up, and turned their
bull's-eye lanterns on to the tender, into which Barnett
at once climbed. The mail-bags, ordinarily so
neatly arranged, lay scattered in pell-mell
disorder on the floor, the Plymouth bag had been
shifted from the hook on which it had been hung,
and, on examining it, Barnett found it had been
opened, and re-tied but not re-sealed; short bits
of string, splotches of sealing-wax, and drifting
pieces of tindered paper covered the floor of the
tender, and the window on the further side—
which had been carefully closed when they left
Bristol—was open. "They've done me!" roared
old Barnett again; "but they shan't escape!
they're somewhere in this train, and I'll have
them out!"

At this juncture two gentlemen, one of whom
was recognised as Mr. Marlow, one of the directors
of the company, the other as Mr. Joyce, the
great contractor, to whom the safe keeping of a
great portion of the permanent way was
confided, came up and inquired what was the matter.
On the affair being explained to them, they
agreed with Barnett as to the necessity for
closely searching the train, and all proceeded at
once to the first-class carriage which was
immediately next to the post-office tender. This, as
is usual, was divided into three double compartments.
The first was that from which Messrs.
Marlow and Joyce had just emerged, and was, of
course, empty; so was the second; in the nearest
division of the third compartment was an old
gentleman named Parker, well known on the line
as a solicitor of Modbury, whose business
frequently took him to London. The door between
the divisions in this carriage was closed and the
blind drawn down. On being recognised, Mr.
Parker at once answered to his name, and stated
that the further division was occupied by two
men who had entered the carriage at Bristol, and
had at once closed the door and drawn down the
blind. Had he noticed anything further about
them? No, he had not. Yes! as they got in he
noticed something dragging after them;
unperceived by them, he put down his hand and found
it to be a piece of string. He cut off what
remained on his side when they shut the door, and
here it was. Barnett looked at it, and exclaimed,
"Bag string, official bag string without a doubt!"
One of the railway guards then opened the door
and looked into the other division. In it were
two men; one of them with a Jim Crow hat
pulled over his eyes, and enveloped in a large
thick cloak, was lying with his legs upon the
opposite seat, and was apparently suffering from
the toothache, as he held his pocket-handkerchief
up to his face; the other a tall man in a
dark Chesterfield great-coat, was screwed into
his corner of the carriage, and was apparently
asleep. "Tickets, please!" called out old
Barnett, and as the reclining man raised himself to
get at his ticket the handkerchief fell from his
face, and the railway guard, recognising him at
once, called out, "Hallo, Pond! is that you?
What are you doing down the line?" Instead
of answering this question, Pond told the guard
to go to the devil; but Mr. Marlow had heard
the exclamation, and asked the guard whether
the man in the carriage was Pond, formerly a
guard in their service, who had been dismissed
some six months before on suspicion of robbery.
The guard replying in the affirmative, old
Barnett's previous suspicions were fully confirmed,
and he insisted on having both the men (who, of
course, declared they were strangers to each
other) thoroughly searched. Nothing at all
extraordinary was found on either of them, but
from the pocket of the carriage in which they
had been travelling were taken a crape mask, a
pair of false moustachios, a bit of wax-candle,
and some sealing-waxed string. As the time for
the starting of the train had now arrived, old
Barnett and Mr. Parker travelled in one
compartment with Pond, while the two railway
guards took charge of his anonymous friend, and
thus they journeyed to Plymouth, where, on their
arrival at the station, the prisoners were at once
taken into one of the waiting-rooms under
Barnett's custody, while the others proceeded to
search the carriages for further traces of the
robbery. That was an anxious time for old Tom
Barnett; he felt convinced that these were the
culprits, but if they had made away with their
spoil, if something were not found the
identification of which could be ratified beyond doubt,
he knew that the prosecution would fail. At
last the men entered bearing a bundle. "Here
it is, all right!" said one of them.

"What is it?" asked Barnett.